“These poems are sharp and precise, and the engine of them, I believe, is generosity—the generosity of Daniella Toosie-Watson, who sees the poem inside of the poem, sees the poem within the smallest insect, the smallest moment on the television screen that you do not see. What a gift this book is.”

—Hanif Abdurraqib, author of There’s Always This Year

“The question in Daniella Toosie-Watson’s poem ‘The Bug’ is ‘Is this a leap?’ Absolutely. A leap over or onto a prone body or a chasm. A leap from one country to another state of mind. A leap into iterations of circumstances, then, at last, beyond. What We Do with God is a daring, vulnerable, and uncanny book that dares to consider ‘God’ transmutable. Toosie-Watson doesn’t shy away from animalia, mortality, the maternal, or God. Here, the body may change its form, and the form itself might change its mind. If there is a mind–body–spirit separation, Toosie-Watson isn’t having it. God and sex are not at war but intertwined, are . . . of a piece. Expect only the utterly unexpected. Even the titles startle, as in ‘The Dead Rat Will Remind You of Your Dad and You Won’t Sleep for Weeks.’ After reading this, I won’t. Toosie-Watson writes, ‘Love is not a coward,’ and upon reading this astonishing first book, you will know: neither is she.”

—Vievee Francis, author of The Shared World

“Do not mistake the whimsy and irreverence blooming through this collection as a lack of gravity—it is quite the opposite. These poems reinforce how brutally essential a playful imagination is to reckon with a deadly world where faith and grace are hard-earned. Toosie-Watson has compiled a glorious collection burning bright with a wild wit and an even more ferocious wisdom.”

—Tarfia Faizullah, author of Seam and Registers of Illuminated Villages

“What We Do with God is a book of thresholds, with each poem mapping a divine passage in the body into language. Grounded, intimate, and embodied, these poems alchemize the mysterious tension between body and spirit—to revel in being vulnerable to become holy, to experience the tenderness of God in the mundane, to know mercy by knowing oneself. This is a luminous collection; Toosie-Watson is a transformational poet.”

—Vanessa Angélica Villarreal, author of Magical/Realism